Golden Slumber
by Sputnik2006
Summary: RR Lily's last moments before (and, weirdly, after) being murdered by Voldemort. Songfic to a lullaby.


Note: Ok, so it may sound odd, doing a songfic to a lullaby. But is it really that strange? The lullaby is Golden Slumber. I have never actually heard it but...the words sounded pretty to me. ^_^ Lyrics in parentheses. I suck in the drama department. Normally an idea this warm and fluffy inside makes me run around screaming until I hit a wall. (Fortunately there was the whole 'Lily must die in a few minutes' gruesomeness so I wasn't too creeped out. Yay for fear and pain! .........Sorry 'bout that.) This is also my first songfic. Bear with me here.  
  
Disclaimer: Do you think I am J.K. Rowling? Do I LOOK like I have kids, fans, and lots of money? Nope, didn't think so. Just to set it clear: I am NOT the owner of Harry Potter but because the wonderful author of the series continues to let her fans show their love of her characters in writing I DO own this fic. And I don't know who owns the lullaby so I can't really give a shout out to them but just know it ain't mine.  
  
Another note: The words Harry heard in the third book are NOT included in here. That is for two reasons. It's plagiarism being one reason, though not by any means a big problem. *coughDISCLAIMERcough* Then there is the fact that at the time of writing this my PoA copy has run away with my sister and won't return for a while. So. Have fun reading my noncommittal try at recreating past moments. ^_^ Try to enjoy!  
  
Golden Slumber  
  
It seemed so long since Lily had last heard her husband's voice.  
  
She huddled in the shadows, waiting for something to happen, dreading what it might be. Harry was hugged close to her chest, wrapped tight in a blanket. She hoped he would stay asleep. One cry from him and she was lost.  
  
And what of James?  
  
The memory of his scream still echoed in her head. How could it not? The cloying darkness made time seem infinite but she knew it could not have been so long ago. Her heart did not want to believe it but her rebel mind spoke clearly enough for both.  
  
Her husband was dead. And her son was in danger.  
  
And there was, of course, a hardened, insane murderer somewhere in the house. That one wasn't easy to forget.  
  
(Golden slumber kiss your eyes, smiles await you when you rise)  
  
Harry stirred in her arms and began to fuss. He didn't like being squished in such an undignified manner, it seemed. Or perhaps he had simply caught her fear. He wriggled about like mad and she feared he might start to cry louder. Desperate to stop his noise she rocked him slowly and hummed a wordless tune softly into his ear.  
  
(Sleep,  
  
pretty baby, do not cry)  
  
Harry fussed for a few moments more before he found her fingers and began playing with them as calm as could be. Lily admired the baby. He knew so little about the world and yet he seemed to know when it was a bad moment to be found. She hummed some more and stroked his baby-soft hair. More for her own comfort now than his, she knew, but it was still imperative to keep his silence.  
  
Babbling quietly he yawned and stuck his fingers in his mouth. In the darkness she could not actually see his softened baby features but she knew he was falling back asleep. The nameless tune continued for some time until she felt quite sure his breathing was the even-measured breathing of sleep.  
  
(and I'll sing you a lullaby.)  
  
Fear crept back into her mind as she crouched there on the floor. How long had she sat here, waiting to die? Where was Voldemort, for he was surely still in the house. He was not one to kill and come back later; Harry was far too important to risk such actions anyway. Was he playing with her?  
  
A soft, steady thump of heavy feet making their sure way toward her.  
  
Lily held her breath. Was it too much to hope he would not check in the closet where she hid? The door swung smoothly open on well-oiled hinges.  
  
The cursed hall lighting made him loom more than she felt a human being ought to. But then he always was less than human. Not to mention her fear was probably making him seem more the monster of her mind's creation than he really was. Not that the monster he really was differed so very much.  
  
"Stand aside girl."  
  
She hated that voice. Not the sinister, deep voice of Muggle villains. It seemed so normal and yet more dangerous than anything else in the world. She felt like a child in front of him, he her darkest nightmare and her unable to wake up. Or was that just reality?  
  
"I won't let you hurt Harry!" she shouted at him.  
  
Harry had woken now. His cries entered the din of noises in the small hall. She didn't know what was going on anymore. The room was suddenly quite silent to her, though a voice in the back of her mind told her it wasn't supposed to be. There were two others in here making a great deal of noise.  
  
Lily's heart stopped at the scene in front of her.  
  
Voldemort was right there with her, inches from her body. He was trying to move her from Harry to finish what he had started. She tried to defend herself but realized too late what was happening.  
  
She was already dead. ~~~~~~~~~  
  
There are few who would be able to tell of what happens shortly after a person dies. Those few being, of course, the ghosts that wander about in the Wizarding world. Even they would be unable to tell after a small amount of time had passed. Death has his own secrets and he wishes them to be kept. He has his ways of making dark memories forgotten.  
  
Lily had no choice but to watch as Voldemort uncovered the wailing baby Harry from her robes. She screamed in despair when he turned his wand upon the sleeping infant. Despair turned quickly to joy and glee seconds later. The spell had backfired! So the night was not so terrible as if could have been.  
  
"Lily?"  
  
She spun around in the wreckage of what had been their home mere minutes before. "James!"  
  
He caught her in a huge hug, holding her so close she would have been in pain. Would have if she could still feel such things. She couldn't stop the sobbing that came over her then as she embraced her husband again. "I-I had thought I'd never see you again! When h-he came I just ran and I didn't know what had happened to you so I thought the worst and then it t-turned out to be true and I had done nothing to prevent it! And I felt like such a terrible wife and-and...." she trailed off into meaningless babble, not sure she even knew what she meant to say.  
  
"You could never be a terrible wife. Never if you tried. You did what you could to save our son." He moved away from her for a moment to find the baby in the rubble. Harry was bawling louder than she had ever heard him. Or she thought he was.  
  
Lily blinked, the circumstances of her death coming back to her. "Can we not hear him because we are dead?"  
  
Her husband opened his mouth to answer but a new voice answered instead. "That is indeed one of the laws of this land. The dead may not speak with the living until they have made their choice."  
  
As one she and James spun to the source of the voice. He was squatting a few feet away, digging through the wreck with interest. The 'he' was the easy part to identify for he was decidedly male by his voice. The problem was that she could not put an age or description to him at all. His appearance seemed to shift before her eyes, rapid and dizzying. One moment he had the face of a young boy, the next he was like to a middle-aged Chinese man, always shifting.  
  
As if he had forgotten he had been dead for some time already James moved in front of her. A small smile briefly played across her face. He always was there to protect her, no matter what the odds. "Who are you? What choice are you talking about?"  
  
The man stood and strolled along past the couple, completely at ease. What were a few smoldering piles of ruin to him? Anger was starting to rise but it was pushed down by the curiosity welling up in her. What happened after dying and what did this man know?  
  
The man smiled to himself as he blew the flames off the fur of a singed teddy bear and lay it down beside Harry. "You do not already know who I am? I am that which is opposite Life, the Keeper of the Balance, as I was once called. In your language my name is Death though in truth I do not have a name. You need to know little about me, for you will forget of our meeting soon after I leave. There are two things: One is that I am neither evil nor good, light nor dark. Such things are for Life to deal out. I merely keep the universe in order by making sure there is never too much good or evil in the world.  
  
"The second thing I have told you already. I come to give you a choice, as I do every creature that comes to me. After a body dies the soul remains aware nearby for approximately an hour. In that time you are to decide whether you are called to stay behind on Earth or whether you will go on to the next world and what awaits you there. There are some things to keep in mind. If you remain behind on Earth you are tied to that world for the rest of eternity, there is no way of changing your mind. Any buisness you feel you have to do can only last so long. Eternity is a terrible price to pay for such petty things as can come from your lives."  
  
"So you are saying that if we want to stay behind and don't leave this world we become ghosts?" James didn't seem to like that idea too much. She was silently in agreement. She had seen the ghosts at Hogwarts. Never once had she seen them very happy. It must be a terrible way to go about. Every person you meet capable of moving on while you were anchored where you were forever. The loneliness alone was enough to keep her from that option. Death seemed to read her thoughts. "Then it is done. The two of you will go on to the next life when your time on this world runs out. Now I must go."  
  
James had glanced at her with an approving nod when he figured out her wishes but now he turned his attention back to the man. "How will we know where to go when our 'time on this world runs out'?"  
  
"Do not worry. You will know when the time comes. Enjoy your time with your son while you can." Death turned away from them and disappeared in the blink of an eye. ~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Lily knew their time was almost up. She could feel it, as if her very substance were getting thinner, less anchored together. James seemed to feel the same. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him hugging himself, like that would make him feel more in one piece.  
  
(Care you know not,  
  
Therefore sleep,)  
  
She wasn't paying any attention to that though. Harry had snuggled up to the fire-scarred teddy and was drifting slowly to sleep. She lay down beside him, face inches away, and began to hum the lullaby one last time.  
  
(While I o'er you watch do keep.)  
  
While she could not hear him it seemed as though he could hear her clearly. For a moment his closing eyes widened in confusion. His mouth moved in some baby babble or other that she couldn't hear. Though her soul hurt that she could not hear him any longer it felt better that she could let him know she loved him.  
  
(Sleep,  
  
pretty darling,  
  
Do not cry,)  
  
He settled down again. Sooner than she had hoped, really. His silent sleep left a part of her gone. Her last reason to remain had been fulfilled. She knew it was time.  
  
"James?" Lily stood up and took her husband's hand in hers. Together they walked away. Away to where the life they knew ended completely and to where a new life began.  
  
And the baby Harry slept on, to wake up only when he felt it was time to, unaware that his life would never be normal from that day forward. What did a baby care about the workings of the world? He had what he wanted right then. He had a lullaby to carry him to sleep.  
  
(And I will sing a lullaby.) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Yeah, it didn't turn out to be much of a songfic did it? What do you expect though, having the whole thing set around a song 13 lines long, or whatever it was? So, was I really as sucko as I thought I was? Was I worse? Better? REVIEW!!! Tankies. 


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